April 30, 2010

Amidst All The Black And The Undone

So high. Just amazing, the view from up here. There are few clouds in sight, apart from the one I'm on of course. Floating is freeing, physically. What happened?

Firstly, let there be words.

Entanglement
Written words
Desolace
Gentle whispering
Forgotten

Flickering street light
Breathing
Footsteps
Nowhere in particular
Crowds
But no one

Broken inertia
Dream of the day
Awakening
Eyes widening
Anchored heart
Pull
Pull

Yearning to escape
Confronting the past
Dancing
Empathy
Emotions are loss, abandonment
Question
Floating in the yonder

Now, let there be a story.

Somehow, beneath the following tracks of the pendulum, the earth moves. It slumbers and turns, awaiting to meet the yonder by breaking through. In purgatory, I await entangled, nearly daily trying to break free, to escape. This is no prison sentence, no "Mein Kempf" to go with the lyrics scraped on the walls of the cell. I shan't personalise it, I might become attached and grow emotional claws to hold on. But the written words are clear. In this world, this desolace, I am alone, free to weep, to crawl, to deny, to seethe, to participate, to cower. Existentialism dawned on me recently in my cell. Characterised by a shadow of hopelessness and other nasty feelings that I'd rather not feel but still are part of my available pallet (because I still decide to make use of them in my artistry efforts), the day is a process of getting up and getting through. Occasionally there is a gentle whispering, not nearly loud enough to deafen the silence, but noisy enough to remind me that I can still hear, that I am still here. It's soothing, but as soon as I turn my head towards it, the quiet that had never left returns and I am once more left sitting by myself. This is the only opportunity I have of remembering that I am forgotten. No one knows I am here. I used to not know too, then my frontal lobe developed and my place was revealed. Its purpose is yet unknown to my physical eyes, but in the greater scheme of things, I am there, certain.

In the evening, through the bars of the cell I can see a lone street light, lit. When I watch it, it flickers and this exposes the flying specks of dust orbiting around their star. I'm somewhere in that solar system, probably in a prison cell too, wondering why. There is nothing else to wonder about. When it's cold, I huddle in a corner with a make-believe blanket. My breathing is then visible, an expelling of steam from the mouth of a dragon that never really had a chance to live. Another one of my fantasies is hearing footsteps. I sometimes hear them through the same ear and from the same area that the whispering comes from. But like the latter, it disappears when I turn my head, when I try to trap the perpetrator into my net of judgmental sight. I haven't caught anyone so far, and I don't expect to, but I still do it. It's a habit of being for so long nowhere in particular. There is no certainty, everything is a blur, so any expectation would become lost in fog or amongst the crowds. There are other people here. I am whispered that they are my brothers, but they are faceless, they don't look anything like me. I get the feeling that many of them are in their own prison cells but they are always free when I watch them circle the street light. Shadows dance as it flickers and it makes whatever they are doing that much more mysterious and odd. Watching them, I found myself circling in the middle of the room, trying to copy them, but I wasn't getting anywhere because I was nowhere. So I stopped, but I still watch them now and then. But no one looks back at me. Sometimes they look at my feet, but I get the sensation that they are looking through me for the moon or some other celestial object they can orbit around.

All time is in this piece of fresh avocado I present. The inertia is broken in my ambling from bar to bar, yearning, pretending. I have my dream of the day. I am an astronaut floating in space, sans the suit, traversing distances that are relatively insignificant. I am a light, or inside a light, and I watch as faces I obviously recognise but fail to identify shimmer into view only to fade the next second. I am whispering back to the gentle whispering, telling it that I want to know where it comes from, and it replies by repeating the same question I ask it. I am in front of a glass through which I see the flickering street light, the orbiting, the circling, and then I see my silhouette trapped in the glass like some painting I wouldn't want on my personally autographed mirror walls. When the awakening comes, I simply see the light from the street light for a longer few seconds without flickering. My eyes widen then, because I can see more. Light lights the way and grants me vision. I cannot see in darkness, which is why I have been blinded for so long. I probably scared the gentle whispering and the footsteps away through my rash actions or my lack of initial acknowledgment. I couldn't see. I have a heart though, and because I couldn't see, I have anchored it until further notice, i.e. until I can be free and see and let it beat. When I awaken, and I look out at the brothers going in circles, I pull. I pull because I want to join them. I pull the chain because their own version of this great tragedy appears to at least be more mobile than mine. That makes it interesting, I suppose, and more bearable.

Despite my imprisonment and my settling into this null world as if it were my home, I still yearn to escape. Even after so long here, I do want to leave. Comfortlessness is comforting only until I realise that there is no comfort in it. Contradictions... there is an ample amount lying around in the recesses of my mind, by the bars, in my dreams, around the street light. Somehow I am anchored into a prison from which I may not leave. Here, I am condemned. I have to confront my past, not because I have to, but because I cannot let myself not do it. I cannot see anything different but darkness until I face the light. Dancing. It helps sometimes to put myself in the non-ritualistic mood that is required of me for such realisation. If only those brothers of mine would be more empathetic towards me. If only they could see me, maybe they could tell me how to find myself amidst all the black and the undone. Because, I feel abandoned. I feel an emotion of loss. No one is here. Not even me. This makes me sad. One question arises, in many forms, though. Who is the dragon? Who is the astronaut? Who is the brother? I float there in the yonder, right by my side, and I wait with open arms for my return.

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